Tim McGraw’s Emotional Purge, Due in May

I usually think an album was just an album, but Tim McGraw reminds me that it can be so much more than that.

In a recent interview, McGraw said every time he makes an album, it’s a way to cleanse himself emotionally.

“It’s about making a great record, about making something you feel proud of, making something that sort of purges you emotionally,” he said. “If it doesn’t purge you emotionally, then you’re not gonna have the reaction you want from the fans who listen to it. … Music has to be cathartic, and all art is about purging your emotions.”

Wow, right? That makes me really curious to see what he puts on his upcoming album, due out in May.

“I mean, that’s why people enjoy it and that’s why people go to a movie,” he added. “Because they can cry and they feel better about crying after they come out. Or it makes you think and it makes you reflect.”

His latest hit “Lookin’ for That Girl” doesn’t seem all that cathartic to me. But, then again, maybe radio singles aren’t the best example of this purging. On McGraw’s last album, Two Lanes of Freedom, the hit songs like “Truck Yeah”
and “Southern Girl”
are the far end of the emo spectrum. But if you were obsessed with that album like I was, you know that “Number 37405,” “Book of John” and “Nashville Without You” were songs that made you stop, think and reflect. Definite purges, I think.

McGraw says songs that leave some questions unanswered are the ones that tend to hold up even after you’ve heard them several times.

“It’s what makes art propel and makes an artist propel, and makes listeners stay engaged with you,” he said.